Authors in the Media – September 2022

The TLS

Michael Smith’s THE REAL SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP continues to garner stellar press. The Times Literary Supplement (right) featured it as a lead review with an introduction by the editor in chief. It was described as “a lucid account, rich in anecdote and detail.”

The Cipher Brief, a daily email put out by a US organization which produces reports on intelligence issues by former prominent spooks, also published its own review and notes “Smith’s careful research enables him to challenge a few myths.”

The book was also reviewed in Country Life Magazine by Allan Mallison.

“Michael Smith was an intelligence professional before turning to journalism. There are few as qualified as he to put the whole story together and few who could tell it with such cogency. He relates the 80 years’ cooperation between the intelligence communities (principally the SIS and CIA) in astonishing and revelatory detail, with pace, clarity and authority. It is, quite simply, magnificent.”

And by John Rathbone, the Financial Times’ security & defence correspondent, who said:

“Michael Smith, a former military intelligence officer and author of several books about spying, handles the material judiciously and writes with élan.”

Country Life - August 2022Mary Novakovich’s MY FAMILY AND OTHER ENEMIES published August 18 and was featured in Country Life (right). She also appeared on DK Travel’s Where To Go podcast, the Travel Writing World podcast, Destination Food Drink and Monocle Reads: Meet the Writers.

Seth Thevoz’s BEHIND CLOSED DOORS was reviewed in The Spectator Australia, noting “despite the vastness of its ambition, Behind Closed Doors serves as a well-researched one-stop introduction to the complex social history of the club.”

The London Review of Books also wrote an illuminating essay about the book and Clubland in general.

The book was also reviewed in The Financial Times, saying:

“This well-researched romp through the history of the capital’s private members’ clubs overturns many myths along the way… Compendious and entertaining, Behind Closed Doors: The Secret Life of London Clubs is the result of thorough research, lightly worn. Thévoz writes with energy, conviction and amusement at the ever-changing variety of human congregation and its foibles.”

The hall of the Athenaeum, c. 1840. [Getty Images]

Caroline Boggis-Rolfe’s ADRIATIC published on August 15 and she appeared on The History Hack podcast.

Henry Schlesinger also discussed honey traps on the Spycraft 101 podcast.

THE WOMEN BEHIND THE FEW to Biteback Publishing

World rights to historian and lecturer Dr Sarah-Louise Miller’s debut work The Women Behind the Few: Women in WWII British Air Intelligence has gone to Biteback Publishing.

The book will investigate the work of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force behind significant and famous air operations in the Second World War, including the Battle of Britain, the Dambusters raid, the Thousand Bomber Raids and the discovery of the German V weapons using aerial reconnaissance.

It also examines the rationale behind the RAF not wanting to employ women in intelligence work, and the emotional reactions of women to warfare and their ability to keep secrets as part of this examination.

Sarah-Louise MillerSarah-Louise Miller graduated in May 2022 with a PhD from the Department of War Studies, King’s College London and is uniquely qualified to write this book, having spent the past five years working full time on researching women in British intelligence roles.

Most recently, she appeared on a six-part television documentary series for Sky History speaking about the bombing campaigns of the RAF during WWII. She also helped actor Ralf Little investigate his grandfather Arthur’s experiences during the Second World War on BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are?

1 April 2023 is the 105th anniversary of the creation of both the Royal Air Force and its women’s counterpart, the Women’s Royal Air Force (which, in WWII, was renamed and became the WAAF). The book will coincide with the commemoration of this date in 2023.

Authors in the Media – August 2022

On July 20th Michael Smith launched his new book at Bletchley Park, The Real Special Relationship: The True Story of How the British and US Secret Services Work Together, published on August 4.

Michael Smith with (l-r) former CIA Director ⁦John Brennan, former MI6 Chief John Scarlett and former GCHQ Director Robert Hannigan.
At Bletchley Park: Michael Smith with (l-r) former CIA Director ⁦John Brennan, former MI6 Chief John Scarlett and former GCHQ Director Robert Hannigan.
Mark Urban reported for BBC Newsnight at the launch of The Real Special Relationship from Bletchley Park, including interviews with Sir John Scarlett, John Brennan and Michael Smith. Interviews begin at 28:00.

The Real Special Relationship was also in The Times’ recommended reading list for the new prime minister.

Alan Judd reviewed the book for the Spectator.

Michael also appeared on the True Spies podcast, narrated by Vanessa Kirby, with former CIA case officer Jim Lawler to lift the lid on a rare joint operation between the CIA and MI6.

Seth Thevoz’s new book Behind Closed Doors (published July 28) had wide coverage in the national newspapers, including The Observer, The Times, The Telegraph and The Sunday Times.

He also appeared on Times Radio with Michael Portillo. The interview can be found here, approximately 1 hour 35 minutes in.

Neil Robinson’s spy novel The Other Side of Trust was reviewed on the popular Spybrary podcast.

Mark Simmons appeared on BBC Radio Cornwall discussing his new book Alistair MacLean’s War.

Finally, Mary Novakovich is featured in this month’s edition of The Lady Magazine, recalling her first trip to Croatia. Her new travelogue/memoir, My Family and Other Enemies: Life and Travels in Croatia’s Hinterland, is published by Bradt on 18 August. In the meantime, Bradt has just published an extract on its website.

Authors in the Media – July 2022

A round up of agency authors’ recent press coverage and media appearances.

Sarah-Louise MillerSarah-Louise Miller features as an expert on the new documentary series, now airing on Sky History on Mondays at 9pm – ‘Bomber: Terror of WWII’.

She also helped actor Ralf Little investigate his grandfather Arthur’s experiences during the Second World War on BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are?

Mary Novakovich has been busy writing for The Guardian and The Telegraph, with all the best recommendations for traveling hidden Croatia and under the radar French cities.

Dan Collyns reports from South America for The Guardian, on the tragic circumstances leading to the death of fellow journalist and colleague Dom Phillips, including the Javari valley: the lawless primal wilderness where Dom Phillips went missing and the narco war in the deadly Amazon region where he disappeared.

Michael Smith and Henry Schlesinger teamed up for a 3-parts series for the True Spies podcast, narrated by actress Vanessa Kirby, to uncover the real stories behind some of history’s most explosive honeytrap operations: Operation Diamond; Anna Chapman and Leon Trotsky.

Henry also wrote pieces for HistoryNet: Founding Forger: How Benjamin Franklin Mastered the Art of Fake News and for Graydon Carter’s AirMail on Hardy Amies: The Spy Who Dressed Me.

Hardy Amies
(CREDIT David Montgomery/Getty Images) British fashion designer Hardy Amies (1909 – 2003), circa 1985. (Photo by David Montgomery/Getty Images)

Xue Yiwei was reviewed in the TLS for his new novel Celia, Misoka, I by Jeff Wasserstrom.

Finally, Seth Thevoz, whose latest book is Behind Closed Doors: the Secret Life of London’s Private Members’ Clubs, is quoted in The Guardian about the Carlton Club’s links to Tories. 

Sarah Black Spy Series by Lucy Hooft to Burning Chair

World English Rights have gone to Burning Chair for the former assistant to Queen Rania and author long listed for The Caledonia Prize Lucy Hooft‘s THE KING’S PAWN and THE HEAD OF THE SNAKE, the first two books in the Sarah Black spy series, based on the author’s real-life experiences.

The series follows the career of a spy who begins as a naïve young graduate, enticed into a career with MI6 (or so she thinks) by a silver-tongued spook; struggling to understand her place in her mentor’s murky hierarchy.

The first novel sees Sarah sent to the Caucasus by Michael, the head of an off-the-books operational section of MI6. She is being used as an expendable and deniable agent, but through her natural pluck (and a hefty dose of luck) she survives and uncovers the real villain and a Russian plot to assassinate the Georgian and US Presidents.

In the second book, Sarah – still inexperienced but significantly tougher with the confidence of a lucky start behind her – strikes out on her own without Michael’s help to war-torn Sierra Leone to bring the villain of book 1 to justice.

Lucy studied languages and philosophy at Oxford and joined the Foreign Office straight out of university in search of adventure and new people and places. She quickly moved across to the Department for International Development (DFID), where she spent time in Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, China and Sierra Leone. She left Sierra Leone to join her now husband in Jordan, taking the long way there across the Sahara, Europe, the Balkans, Turkey and Syria in a much-beloved Land Rover. In Jordan, she worked for Her Majesty Queen Rania while spending much time bumping around the phenomenal Jordanian desert.

After Jordan, she spent several years in a jungle camp in Gabon surrounded by elephants and humpback whales, which is where the Sarah Black books began. They took life, as a way to record all the best bits of people she had met and places she had been, with a plot to make them much more exciting. Lucy has always plausibly denied being a spy—but she wrote the books to show what that life might have been like.

She now lives at the end of the world in Lüderitz, Namibia, crafting stories and making films about the adventure of growing giant kelp.

THE KING’S PAWN will publish in 2022 followed by THE HEAD OF THE SNAKE in 2023.

Authorised Biography of WHITNEY STRAIGHT to The History Press

The History Press has secured World Rights to the first authorised biography of the racing driver, aviator, war hero, and industrialist Whitney Straight.

A gripping tale of speed, heroism, romance, determination, and tragedy: Whitney Straight was born into great wealth in New York, the eldest of three children – his sister would become an Oscar-winning actress and his brother the youngest of the Cambridge spies. He dropped out of Cambridge to become an outstanding racing driver and ran his own team against Hitler’s Silver Arrows. A qualified pilot at 17, he revolutionised aircraft design.

Whitney Straight

His extraordinary war saw him rise from Flying Officer to Air Commodore. He survived the disastrous invasion of Norway, a crash-landing in occupied France, and spent a year as a PoW. He turned down Churchill’s proposal of a career in politics to become CEO of BOAC, transforming it from a sales vehicle for outmoded aircraft into a national airline to be proud of. At Rolls-Royce, he railed against a company dominated by engineers who made poor businessmen, and after the national tragedy of the great company going bust, played a fundamental role in the splitting of the auto and aero businesses still seen today.

Paul Kenny has been granted unfettered access to Straight’s diaries and photograph albums and has scoured archives on both sides of the Atlantic, leaving no stone unturned in pursuit of the first full story of one of the twentieth century’s greatest mavericks.

The book will be published in September 2023. Audio Rights have been sold to Blackstone Audio USA.

LENIN: ONE AGAINST ALL by Roberto Echavarren to Academica Press

World English Language rights to Uruguayan poet, essayist, and translator and winner of the National Prize of the Ministry of Culture of Uruguay Roberto Echavarren‘s One Against All: Lenin, His Government and Legacy have gone to Academica Press.

One century later, we are now in a position in which we can achieve a certain balance in our views on what Lenin’s government meant for Russia and for the world. With chapters on the evolution of land tenancy in Russia, the collectivization of land under Stalin, and the suppression of sexual minorities under Soviet rule, this book adds breadth and scope to our understanding of Lenin’s government and legacy.

The stream of new archival material from Russia is dwindling. Overwhelmed by history’s damning evidence, apprehensive before the West and its scholars, and encouraged by Vladimir Putin’s autocratic nationalism, Russians are closing their archives.

One Against All: Lenin, His Government and Legacy, was originally written and published in Spanish. It will now be available in English translation.

Roberto taught at New York University from 1975 to 1995 in the Spanish and Portuguese, and Comparative Literature Departments. He is the director of La Flauta Mágica publishing company, specializing in critical bilingual editions of poetry and the rescue of major poetical works written in Spanish. Prize wins include the National Prize of the Ministry of Culture of Uruguay, essay; National Prize of the Ministry of Culture of Uruguay, poetry; Nancy Bacelo Foundation Poetry Prize; Cultural Center of Spain Theatre Prize. He was also awarded the 2021 Amado Alonso International Prize of Literary Criticism for his book El pensamiento chino (Chinese Thought) and will be published soon by Editorial Pre-Textos in Spain.

WHEN THE BRITISH MUSICAL RULED THE WORLD by Robert Sellers to Applause Books

World Rights to Robert Sellers’ new book have gone to Applause Books.

This book focuses on the big ‘7,’ mega productions of the 80s, British musicals that were larger than life, colourful and spectacular, shows that certainly paved the way for the ‘event’ musicals of recent years such as The Lion King and Wicked.

Evita ran for seven years in the West End and four years on Broadway and ushered in an era when for over a decade Britain dominated musical theatre all over the world with blockbusting productions that were international hits, notably Cats, Starlight Express, Les Misérables, Phantom of The Opera, Chess and Miss Saigon.

For the very first time, many of the artists will celebrate and tell this extraordinary period in British musical history, both behind and in front of the curtain. And many of the stories of backstage dramas, production nightmares, and financial woes have never been told before.

Contributors include Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, Cameron Mackintosh, Michael Crawford, Elaine Paige, Wayne Sleep, David Essex, Michael Ball, Abba’s Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, Sarah Brightman, Barbara Dickson, Trevor Nunn & Patti LuPone.

Robert Sellers is the author of the best-selling ‘Hellraisers: The Life and Inebriated Times of Burton, Harris, O’Toole and Reed,’ and the authorised biographies of Peter O’Toole, Oliver Reed, Ernie Wise, and Kenny Everett. He has written histories of Ealing Studios and the George Harrison/Monty Python film company HandMade Films. He also ghost-wrote the autobiographies of Martin Edwards, ex-chairman of Manchester United, and Vic Armstrong, the world’s most prolific stuntman.

The book will publish late 2022.

Audio Rights for FOLEY: THE SPY WHO SAVED 10,000 JEWS to Blackstone

Blackstone Audio snapped up audio rights in an exclusive submission for Station X and Killer Elite author Michael Smith’s FOLEY: THE SPY WHO SAVED 10,000 JEWS, a story of courage and quiet heroism in the face of great evil – a reminder of the impact that one brave individual can have on the lives of many.

As the horror of Nazism tightened its grip on Germany, Jews found themselves trapped and desperate; for many, their only hope of salvation came in the form of a small, bespectacled British man: Frank Foley.

Working as a Berlin Passport Control Officer, Foley helped thousands of Jews to flee the country with visas and false passports, personally entering the camps to get Jews out, and sheltering those on the run from the Gestapo in his own apartment. Described by a Jewish leader as ‘the Pimpernel of the Jews’, Foley was an unsung hero of the Holocaust.

But why is this extraordinary man virtually unknown, even in Britain? The reason is simple: Foley was MI6 head of station in Berlin, bound to secrecy by the code of his profession.

Founded in 1987, Blackstone Audio is one of the largest independent audiobook publishers in the United States, offering over 30,000 audiobooks. The company is based in Ashland, Oregon with five in-house recording studios.

HONEY TRAPPED sells in Estonia to Aripaev

honey-trapped-coverEstonian language rights have been snapped up by AS Aripaev, based in Tallinn, which is owned by the Swedish family-owned media group Bonnier, brokered by Andrew Nurnberg Baltic.

The book is out now in the UK and will be published in the USA in May.

The Daily Mail recently ran a feature for Femail. Starting with Samson and Delilah, Schlesinger retells famous and lesser-known cases of suspected and confirmed honey trap operations, including that of the most famous femme fatale in history: Mata Hari.

Others include Maria Butina, Anna Chapman and ‘Romeo Spies’ such as Roald Dahl, and the Estonian Vladimir Kivi was betrayed by the double agent Kopatsky and handed over to the Soviets following a night of drinking.